


masked

by susiecarter



Category: Eye Candy (TV)
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Bad Decisions, Casual Sex, Consent Issues, Dubious Consent Due To Identity Issues, Halloween, Hand Jobs, Identity Porn, M/M, Manipulation, Mind Games, Semi-Public Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-29
Updated: 2019-10-29
Packaged: 2021-01-06 06:45:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21222293
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/susiecarter/pseuds/susiecarter
Summary: It's been a really, really long day. Tommy honestly wouldn't mind just calling it quits, checking the fuck out—going home to his own apartment, to Boris, and settling in on the couch for a beer and a nap, streaming something just for the white noise of voices. Closing his eyes, and letting it all go.Except he promised Sophia he wouldn't skip out on her, after all the time and effort she's put into this Halloween bash she's holding at IRL.(Or: Bubonic finds a new way to mess with Tommy's head, one Halloween. A couple new ways, really.)





	masked

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sandrine Shaw (Sandrine)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sandrine/gifts).

> ♥ I'm sorry, I just couldn't help myself—I hope you like this, and happy Shipoween! :D

It's been a really, really long day. Tommy honestly wouldn't mind just calling it quits, checking the fuck out—going home to his own apartment, to Boris, and settling in on the couch for a beer and a nap, streaming something just for the white noise of voices. Closing his eyes, and letting it all go.

Except he promised Sophia he wouldn't skip out on her, after all the time and effort she's put into this Halloween bash she's holding at IRL.

So he goes home, but just to feed Boris and give him a walk around the block. And then he looks at the couch for a long moment, direly tempted; and then he gives in to his own nagging conscience with a sigh, changes clothes and runs a wet hand through his hair and then heads right back out again.

And maybe this is just what he needs. A chance to relax, unwind a little. Take a load off, get tipsy, and let the weight of a whole day dealing with the fallout of stupid Halloween stunts slide off his shoulders.

He manages to tell himself that right up until he actually gets there. Right up until he walks through the door and looks toward the bar, and there are at least a dozen of those goddamn masks.

He bites down hard on the inside of his cheek. It doesn't help. His shoulders have already strung themselves tight again, and god, he should have told Sophia that he was sick, dying, that he'd broken both his legs. He should have known this would happen.

It's been happening all day, is the thing.

The Cyber Crimes unit always ends up covering a lot of different bases on certain days of the year, and one of those days is Halloween. People are doing a lot more stupid dangerous shit than usual, and the PD's spread extra thin trying to deal with it. Tommy ends up out on the street responding to calls or backing up beat cops at least as often as he's behind his desk, on those kinds of days.

And that's how Tommy found out about it.

He didn't even know what was happening, at first. He had no idea. He was just scanning the street, trying to figure out where Officers Cardozo and Neumann might have gone after they'd radioed in for backup. He hadn't expected to spot the mask.

Long, black, beaked. Just the way it's always looked in the videos, the way it always looks in Tommy's goddamn nightmares—

He was running before he knew what he was doing. Pushing past people, eyes fixed on it, heart pounding, mouth dry. Chased that mask half a block before he could corner it. And of course the guy he'd shoved up against a wall so he could tear that mask straight off was—was just a guy. Wide-eyed, spectacled. Broader than Bubonic had ever been in any of the videos, and totally bewildered. No idea what the hell the problem was, he'd said hurriedly, hands raised, but hey, if Tommy wanted the mask, he could have it.

Trying to de-escalate, Tommy had realized dimly. Because as far as he was concerned, some weirdo on the street had just assaulted him out of nowhere.

He'd gotten a grip, apologized. Taken some deep breaths. It was common goddamn sense: Bubonic wouldn't walk around in broad daylight like that. As if all Tommy had ever needed to do was put out an APB on a plague doctor.

He let the guy go, and gave him the mask back. But—

But it was _so much_ like Bubonic's. He had to ask. If this guy was a fan or something, if this was for a reason—if Bubonic had something planned, and this guy had picked up on it—then Tommy wanted to know about it.

"What?" the guy had said, blinking at him. "Oh—yeah, no, it's—it's a whole thing, man. Kind of an underground protest. A reaction against the sicknesses tearing apart modern society, doubling as ironic commentary on our lack of understanding of what to do about them."

Tommy had stared at him.

"Like V for Vendetta," the guy added after a second, "but less 2005. You know?"

And it had only taken a couple more questions for the whole thing to spill out. A movement, like the guy had said. A movement, but not the kind that did anything except make people feel like they were part of something, in the know. Thousands of people connecting to each other online, agreeing that they'd wear masks just like this, all day, for Halloween.

And it had started with one post—anonymous—that had gone viral, and nobody knew who'd written it.

Of course, Tommy had thought. Of fucking course. He'd only just managed to thank the guy for his help without choking on the words on their way out.

And after that—

Dozens of them, so far. They've been everywhere today, those goddamn masks, until Tommy's felt like he can't even turn around without spotting three more of them. And none of them are _actually_ Bubonic. Not all of them, anyway, because they literally can't be.

It just feels like they are. It just feels like he's been walking around seeing Bubonic everywhere, Bubonic's eyes on him the whole time. Because it's not about the sicknesses of modern society, and it's not about any kind of meta-commentary on an institutional inability to diagnose the causes. It's about Tommy, and Tommy knows it. It's Bubonic fucking with his head, and the worst part is that it _works_.

(It works every goddamn time.)

Tommy had been hoping he'd be able to walk into IRL and forget about it. But he should've known better. He should've realized there'd be more of them, that he'd—that he still wouldn't be able to get away.

Sophia's already behind the bar. She must be pleased; IRL is _packed_, and it isn't even that late yet.

And—small favors—she's dressed up as Misty Knight, metal arm and all. No mask, and no black beak in sight.

He manages to work his way close enough to catch her eye, without getting called out for cutting the line. She smiles, waves back quick when he waves at her, but she's got eight glasses carefully pinned together between her fingers and she's obviously not going to be able to stop just to say hi.

He eases away, back through the crowd, and has to pass two more plague doctors on the way. He averts his eyes, looks pointedly at the wall instead, but he's already gritting his teeth.

It's—it's too hot in here. It's too hot in here, too crowded, and he's already on edge.

He just needs to get a grip. He needs to cool off, and get a grip, and buy himself a drink, and then it'll be fine and he'll have a great time.

Yeah.

He works his way over to the back hallway that leads toward one set of bathrooms. And if he hadn't already known the night was young, he'd have been able to guess just looking in here: still pretty clean, and mostly empty. It'll probably be at least another hour before he ends up calling an ambulance for anybody passed out back here.

He stands at a sink, runs the water as cold as he can get it and then leans down and splashes his face a couple times. And then a couple more, until his face is dripping with it, cheeks pinking up with the shock of the temperature by the time he looks up at himself in the mirror.

He's just so fucking _frustrated_. It's aimless, undirected, which only makes it simmer hotter. He's got no one to point it at, nothing he can _do_ with it. He isn't even sure what he hates the most: the idea that any one of those goddamn plague doctors inside IRL right now could be Bubonic, and he wouldn't have the first clue—or the idea that none of them are. That Bubonic's just as far out of his reach as ever.

He closes his eyes, and draws a long slow breath. Blinks through the drips, shakes them off, and feels his skin prickle, cool, as it starts to dry.

And then he splashes himself one more time and twists the tap off, and towels his face dry.

It helps. Right up until he's stepping out of the bathrooms again, and there's someone in a black beaked mask in the back hallway.

Tommy's teeth grit themselves without permission. But he might still have been able to handle it if the guy hadn't bumped him on the way past.

Just their shoulders, that's all. Probably an accident—but in a mood like the one Tommy's been in all goddamn day, it doesn't _feel_ like an accident. It feels deliberate, pointed, and before Tommy can stop himself he's rounding on the guy, shoving him into the wall. He's not a cop right now, he doesn't have to leash himself down the way he had to while he was working today. He can just be some asshole at a club who's picking a fight, and if this guy punches him in the face for it, he'll have earned it.

"What's your problem?" Tommy snaps. "Huh?"

"Whoa, whoa," the guy says, swallowing—Tommy can see his throat move, the length of it as pale and narrow as the rest of him. And then, inexplicably, the next thing he adds is, "Oh, god—how'd you even know?"

Tommy blinks at him.

And the guy raises one hand, deliberately slow, no sudden moves, to grip the mask in his hand and pull it up and away.

Jesus. It's that guy. The guy Tommy found in his apartment, the guy who explained what Bubonic had done—while Tommy had a gun in his face.

Tommy lets his eyes fall shut for a second, and blows out a breath. He'd been expecting the guy to have cleaned him out the rest of the way, given that Tommy had rushed back out and just left him in Tommy's apartment alone. But it hadn't happened; he'd come back and the guy had been gone, and he hadn't taken anything else with him as far as Tommy could tell. And then Tommy had been waiting for a complaint to get filed or something, because he'd basically scared the pants off the dude for no reason.

But it hadn't happened. And now here he is again—and why shouldn't he be? He probably lives in the city somewhere. Who'd go further than that to check out somebody's stuff they were offering for free?

"I'm guessing this is about that whole trespassing thing again?" the guy's saying, careful, a little wry.

And then he pauses, still pinned to the wall by Tommy's hands, and looks Tommy up and down more closely.

"Or—maybe not so much," the guy amends, at last. "You okay, man?"

"Fine," Tommy manages. "It's—not your problem. Sorry. I thought you were somebody else."

And he's worn that excuse pretty goddamn thin today, but apparently the guy's willing to accept it.

"Somebody on your shitlist," the guy infers.

Tommy huffs half a laugh through his nose, even though it isn't exactly funny. "You could say that. Or—I'm on his. Maybe both. It's complicated."

The guy's eyebrows have gone up a little. "Sounds like it," he murmurs, almost too quiet to hear beneath the throb of music pounding through the wall. And then he looks Tommy up and down again, but it's different this time. Speculative, almost, and Tommy thinks that about a half-second before the guy tips his head back against the wall and guesses slyly, "Bad break-up, hm?"

Tommy jerks back a little, startled by—by the whole idea. By how ridiculous it is, how ludicrous, to put anything about this mess with Bubonic in those terms. He swallows. His mouth is dry. He doesn't know what to say, and he should; he should say something, he shouldn't just be standing here staring at this guy all wide-eyed.

But the guy doesn't seem thrown by his reaction. The guy's—smiling, actually, just a little. Smug, slanting, just at one edge of his mouth.

"I," Tommy fumbles. "I don't know that I'd call it—"

"Right, no," the guy agrees, but it sounds like a deliberate sop, consciously soothing. Patronizing. "You said it was complicated."

Tommy closes his eyes. He had, but jesus, he hadn't meant it like _that_—

"Just saying," the guy murmurs, and he sounds closer than he was, somehow. He hasn't moved, Tommy's still holding him against the wall; it's Tommy who swayed in a little, blindly. Just trying to catch those low words, that's all. "Seems like you're kind of hung up on this guy."

Tommy squeezes his eyes shut tighter, wets his lips. This is stupid. He shouldn't be listening to this. "I—"

"Sounds," the guy adds, steamrolling right over him, "like you could use somebody to take your mind off him," and then he's—jesus, he's sliding a hand between Tommy's thighs, gripping Tommy's dick through his pants and _squeezing_.

Tommy's half-hard dick, and god, when the hell did that happen?

Tommy makes a sound and doesn't know why—does know why, but doesn't want to, and fuck, he can't do this. "No," he manages to say, "no, wait. Jesus, we can't just—anybody could come along—"

"Then I guess we'd better make it quick, hadn't we?" the guy says, tone warm, deceptively sweet. He's rubbing along the line of Tommy's cock more firmly now, and he's rewarded for it: Tommy's thickening against his hand, really starting to get _hard_ now. He closes his hand around Tommy's inseam, thumb against his fly, and tugs Tommy in by it—_literally_ leading him by the dick, so he'll take a step in closer, crowd the guy against the wall.

And he shouldn't. He shouldn't do it.

But his heart's pounding, his dick hot and heavy in his jeans, his breath coming hard. He could get away. He's the one holding the guy against the wall. All he has to do is walk away.

He doesn't.

He wets his lips again, and opens his eyes; and the guy's watching him with glittering eyes, unreadable.

That hand moves again—groping Tommy's dick more thoroughly through his jeans, fingers outlining the shape of it, proprietary and obscene. Rubbing harder, squeezing again, and god, it should be too rough, the texture and tightness of the denim even through Tommy's boxers. It should be too much, that casual harshness.

But it's not.

Tommy swears under his breath and shoves into it, helpless and greedy, and the smug fucking look on the guy's face when he does just makes it _better_, just makes him harder.

And—jesus, it's crazy, but that fucking mask is still hanging from the guy's free hand.

Tommy twists away from it, face hot, and moves into the guy's grip even harder. There's only so many places to look, though, only so far he can turn when the guy's holding him as close as this, with this tight a grasp on his dick. And with that familiar dark shape in the edge of his vision, it's like—it's like Bubonic's watching him right here, right now. If he were, he'd be amused, probably. Seeing Tommy like this, hard and wanting, desperate enough for it that he's accepting a handjob in a bathroom hallway from a guy whose name he doesn't even know—

—fuck, jesus—

"Oh, god," Tommy grits out, unsteady.

"Come on," the guy murmurs. "That's it, come on. You want it awfully badly, don't you? I could do anything to you right now, and you'd let me as long as I got you off. Are you really that hard up for it? With a pretty face like yours?"

Tommy makes a harsh sound, stumbles another half-step closer so the guy's hand is practically pinned between their hips—so he can press his dick into it harder still, and god, he can't even decide whether he wants the guy to undo his fly or not; whether he wants the guy to just keep rubbing him off without even bothering to get his pants open, making him come in them instead and knowing he's going to have to clean himself up later—

Wait. There's something off about that. Isn't there?

Pretty face. Someone's said that to him before. The—the boyfriend, the pissed-off boyfriend Bubonic tricked into beating him up—

"Well, never mind," the guy says softly, right into his ear. "It hardly matters. I'll take care of it," and he squeezes harder, rubs in one long stroke from Tommy's inseam all the way to the tip of him where it's trapped just under the width of his belt. "And I must admit I rather like the idea that you won't be looking for it again for a while once I'm done."

"Jesus," Tommy breathes, fucking into the guy's hand helplessly.

"You see," the guy adds, almost gently, "I've never been particularly good at sharing, Detective Calligan."

Tommy feels his eyes go wide. And he sucks in a sharp breath and rolls his hips, that bright hot ache sharpening relentlessly to a point, and comes in his pants against the heel of Bubonic's hand.


End file.
